Whatcha Eatin’? Brazilian Food

Whatcha Eatin’? Brazilian Food

Emaan Bangash

POSTED

My knowledge of South American
cuisine is, unfortunately, quite limited and mostly consists of what I’ve seen
in pop culture and other forms of media. However, when I was approached by
former Mercury staff member and friend Madeleine Keith about trying Brazilian food,
I found I had much more to learn than I thought.

As a result of Portugal colonizing
what is now Brazil during the 16th century, Brazilian cuisine isn’t very easily
definable. Perhaps more accurately, it’s an amalgamation of several different
cuisines including European, Mediterranean, Asian and African. In Brazil,
dishes mostly include staple ingredients such as rice, beans and meat such as
beef or chicken. However, there are some unique features to Brazilian cuisine
such as tapioca flour, acai berries and guarana, a fruit used to make a popular
soft drink that carries same name. This time, we tried pao de queijo, a type of
cheesy bread, delicious bon-bons called Sonho de Valsa and the fruity,
caffeinated soda called Guarana.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

To get the most authentic Brazilian
experience, Keith took me to a store called Kiosk Brazil at the intersection of
Alma and Parker Road. Kiosk Brazil is a family-owned business and was opened in
June 2012 after other Brazilian stores in the area started shutting down. Bruna
DeSouza, one of the workers at Kiosk Brazil, told us people from all over Texas
and even visitors from Louisiana and Arkansas travel to the store to get their
favorite Brazilian food and drinks.

The store didn’t look anything
different from some of the Pakistani and Indian stores in my area. It was
packed with items such as Brazilian coffee, cheese, sodas and spices. There
were cases and large bottles of Guarana. The checkout area was stocked with
different snacks — including pao de queijo, the cheesy bread — in heated
display cases.

Pao de queijo was not what I expected at first
bite. It was a little ball of dough the size of a brussels sprout and was very
dense and heavy. From what Keith described at first, I was expecting some sort
of bread filled with soft cheese on the inside. However, the whole piece of
bread had an overall cheesy flavor and the inside was incredibly doughy and
chewy. Though pao de queijo wasn’t like anything I’d ever tried, there’s
something so addictive about cheesy bread in general. I found myself
ordering second and third plates of the bread, much to the amusement of Keith
and DeSouza.

Guarana
is a beloved drink to many Brazilians and contains a surprisingly large amount
of caffeine. A can of Guarana contains double the caffeine compared to a cup of
coffee, which is why the fruit the soda is inspired from is often used as an
ingredient in energy drinks. It tasted like a much smoother and less intense
version of Fanta — almost like someone mixed half a can of ginger ale and Fanta
into a cup. Sodas like Coca-Cola and Pepsi can taste extremely strong when you
first sip them, but Guarana was the exact opposite: flavorful yet simple and
mildly sweet.

Lastly, we had the Sonho de
Valsa, which is a large, decadent bon-bon filled with cashew nut filling that
happens to be one of Brazil’s most popular chocolates. The filling reminded me
of a Ferrero Rocher chocolate, and the combination of flavors between cashew
and chocolate was an unexpected but pleasant experience. DeSouza told me that
during Easter, they would fill large hollow eggs with Sonho de Valsas as a
treat. I could see myself eating tons of them, and the size and ample filling
made them much more satisfying to eat than any regular truffle I’ve had.

For me, it’s very comforting to have access to stores in
the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex that cater to my own culture, so I understand
why the family running Kiosk Brazil wanted to open a store like this. The
Brazilian cuisine I sampled had both familiar and new flavors in its food and
drink, and I can see myself going back and trying more of the foods like pao de
queijo. It was amazing to be able to experience an entirely different culture
through its cuisine at a place that’s only five minutes away from where I live.

Mailing List

The Mercury

The Mercury publishes news, opinion and feature articles of interest and importance to the UT Dallas campus and community, with primary emphasis on news that most directly and immediately concerns students.